The Kingdom of Saguenay (french: Royaume du Saguenay) was a
mythical
Myth is a folklore genre consisting of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not objectively true, the identification of a narrati ...
kingdom
Kingdom commonly refers to:
* A monarchy ruled by a king or queen
* Kingdom (biology), a category in biological taxonomy
Kingdom may also refer to:
Arts and media Television
* ''Kingdom'' (British TV series), a 2007 British television drama s ...
that
French
French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to France
** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents
** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...
-
Breton maritime
Maritime may refer to:
Geography
* Maritime Alps, a mountain range in the southwestern part of the Alps
* Maritime Region, a region in Togo
* Maritime Southeast Asia
* The Maritimes, the Canadian provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Pri ...
explorer Jacques Cartier
Jacques Cartier ( , also , , ; br, Jakez Karter; 31 December 14911 September 1557) was a French- Breton maritime explorer for France. Jacques Cartier was the first European to describe and map the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and the shores of ...
tried to reach in 1535, supposedly located inland of present-day
Quebec,
Canada. The
indigenous people
Indigenous peoples are culturally distinct ethnic groups whose members are directly descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a particular geographic region and, to some extent, maintain the language and culture of those original people ...
had told Cartier about a rich kingdom and Cartier was given two
ships by the French government to explore countries beyond
Newfoundland. In 1542 Cartier founded the
Charlesbourg-Royal
Fort Charlesbourg Royal (1541—1543) is a National Historic Site in the Cap-Rouge neighbourhood of Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. Established by Jacques Cartier in 1541, it was France's first attempt at a colony in North America, and was aband ...
settlement and his crew initially thought they had found large amounts of
diamonds and
gold in the area. The treasures were shipped back to France, but turned out to be
quartz crystal
Quartz is a hard, crystalline mineral composed of silica ( silicon dioxide). The atoms are linked in a continuous framework of SiO4 silicon-oxygen tetrahedra, with each oxygen being shared between two tetrahedra, giving an overall chemical for ...
s and
iron pyrites
The mineral pyrite (), or iron pyrite, also known as fool's gold, is an iron sulfide with the chemical formula Fe S2 (iron (II) disulfide). Pyrite is the most abundant sulfide mineral.
Pyrite's metallic luster and pale brass-yellow hue giv ...
.
Historic evaluation
In 1986 the American historian
Samuel Eliot Morison wrote about the search for the Kingdom of Saguenay by explorers in the time period between 1538 and 1543, during which France regarded the search as a means to an end. France had paid for Cartier's third voyage so as to rebalance power in the nation's favour. After all, England had profited from the discoveries of
John Cabot while Spain acquired wealth from
mines in
Mexico and
Peru.
In 1997 the Canadian historian
Daniel Francis reached the conclusion that Cartier "believed in the fanciful kingdom of Saguenay, rich in gold and diamonds, some of whose inhabitants knew how to fly." Other explorers held similar beliefs about the North of present-day
Canada, including
Martin Frobisher and
Samuel Hearne.
See also
*
Norumbega
Norumbega, or Nurembega, is a legendary settlement in northeastern North America which was featured on many early maps from the 16th century until European colonization of the region. It was alleged that the houses had pillars of gold and the i ...
*
El Dorado
El Dorado (, ; Spanish for "the golden"), originally ''El Hombre Dorado'' ("The Golden Man") or ''El Rey Dorado'' ("The Golden King"), was the term used by the Spanish in the 16th century to describe a mythical tribal chief (''zipa'') or king ...
*
Blond Eskimos
Blonde Eskimos or Blond Eskimos is a term first applied in accounts of sightings of, and encounters with, light-haired Inuit (then known as "Eskimo") peoples of Northern Canada from the early 20th century, particularly around the Coronation Gulf ...
References
Culture of Quebec
Mythological kingdoms, empires, and countries
Canadian mythology
16th century in Canada
First Nations history in Quebec
History of Saguenay, Quebec
Iroquois mythology
{{Norse exploration of the Americas